THE DESIGN AND PRODUCTION OF THE NON-STRUCTURAL BODY SHELL FOR A STREET RACER BUGGY

Introduction
A lot of people do not realize just how exciting RC vehicles have becomethe hobby quality RC cars
made and raced today can get up to speeds of 60 mph and feature suspension systems that can be
tuned just like a real car. Perhaps the most exciting part is the wide variety of types of RC vehicles: you
can drive a race car, run a monster truck on dirt tracks or even fly a plane! (Lowden, 2012).
A really popular category of RC vehicles is the buggy. Buggies are so popular for a number of reasons.
First on the list is the simple fact that they can look quite a lot like F1-race cars. Their added durability
and with it the flexibility to run in more places and also on more surfaces is another added advantage.
While grass or gravel might completely floor a plain old car, a decent buggy can handle them both with
ease. These reasons make them almost perfect; they take light off-road driving in their stride and at the
same time produce excellent results on firmer surfaces such as concrete.
On-road or racing cars are built and designed for speed, while off-road vehicles like buggies are meant
to take more rugged terrain. A good example of an on-road car is the Street Racer; its body design
(especially the non-structural shell) will be outlined in this report.
Body design is an important factor for race cars. Its level of importance can be noticed easily through the
amount of money major car manufacturers invest in the body (Sapuan et al., 2009). The body structure
needs to be rigid to support weight and stress and to securely tie together all the components. It must
also be able to resist and soften the impact of a crash to safely protect the occupant(s).
Lastly, the core element of any car is the body structure. The body is not just made up of the smooth,
aesthetic external designs which majorly are the source of attraction of the vehicles, but it starts from
the non-structural body shell otherwise known as the chassis.
Over the years, various designs have been tried in constructing the body shell of the RC Street Racer,
and each of them has its benefits and drawbacks.

Conceptual design
Conceptual design involves two stages of work which are:
The generation of solutions to meet the stated need.
The evaluation of these solutions to select the one that is most suitable.

Concept 1
Airplane wing design matured by the middle of the twentieth century and it was only natural that race
car designers borrowed successful airplane wing profiles to use on their vehicles. This concept mimics
the design of an aero plane where the vehicle nose is made in the shape of a cone for aerodynamics
purposes. The tip of the nose was designed to be spherical to reduce drag and ensure smooth air flow.
Each curving on the body was made as smooth as possible to reduce air resistance. The body does not
cover the chassis up to the top section because it does not favour the aerodynamic aspect. Also, by
building the body low, it helps to reduce the cars centre of gravity. This concept does not involve many
parts. Hence, it is easy to be fabricated and designed.

Concept 2
This concept emphasizes on drivers safety, it covers the driver from bottom to the top of the chassis. A
windscreen is included in the design to allow clear view for driver. This design is considered
revolutionary and it has several advantages that other designs do not have. This concept utilizes
minimum material at the same time provide maximum protection to the driver. Using less material is an
advantage in racing as it reduces weight and allows higher speed and reaction for the race car. It is
considered as the easiest one to be fabricated due to its simplicity.

Concept 3
Concept 3 is designed by benchmarking Formula Ones standard. It has a front wing, side pod, real wing
and diffuser. These components are not only designed for aerodynamics purposes, but they also provide
stability through down-force. This design reduces the centre of gravity of the vehicle to the barest
minimum and this further improves its stability. Talking about safety, these wings protect the driver
during racing.

There are different methods used when trying to get the best selection method. These methods are:
i) Brainstorming method.
ii) Gallery technique.
iii) Problem decomposition.
iv) Morphology method.
v) Pugh selection

For this particular design, the Pugh selection method (Pugh, 1991), was used to come up with the
conceptual designs. Below is an explanation on this method.
Evaluation and selection of concept using the Pugh selection method
These are the ten criteria put into consideration when trying to get the best selection of design concept
out of the three listed above:
1. Aerodynamics
2. Stability
3. Weight
4. Safety
5. Fabrication
6. Installation
7. Ergonomic
8. Cost
9. Engine cooling
10. Aesthetic

Weighting method is used to determine the relative important of the selected criteria. This method is
used to enhance the selection process to carry out the most optimum design. The weighing factor for
each criterion of the car frame was calculated and the result showed that aerodynamics is the most
important factor in designing the body shell of a car. It is followed by safety, stability, weight, engine
cooling and fabrication. Installation, ergonomic, cost and aesthetic are the least important in this
analysis.
Based on the concept evaluation, Concept 3 was selected as the best design as most of the criteria listed
above reflect in this design rather than the remaining two. For this reason, Concept 3 is analyzed
further.

Analysis on the selected design (Concept 3)

The detail drawing of the selected conceptual design is developed with the aid of CATIA software. The
analysis can be carried out in a better way if a clear drawing is initially made. Several important parts of
the street racer body shell designed are evaluated below. A material selection process should be
conducted in selecting the most optimum material for the car body. In actual F1 car, carbon fiber
reinforced epoxy composite is used in making car body but when it is built and designed locally, carbon
fiber reinforced polymer composite material is a good and cheap material in fabricating the body of a
race car due to its outstanding performance.

Front Wing
The front wing is very vital in the design as it is the first part of the car that comes in contact with the air.
The main purpose of the design is to try and reduce the effect of air flow on the car. The fast incoming
air flow is deviated to other direction through the smooth surface of front wing. The airflow passes
above and beneath the front wing instead of going around it. By doing this, the unwanted drag will be
minimized effectively.
Another purpose of the design is also trying to generate as much downforce as possible to stabilize the
car when it is fast in motion. The first wing is highly important when taking considering the safety aspect
of the car. The front wing plane is made with almost the same width as the car and this in turn allows
more downforce to be generated at the front. In this concept, the downforce is generated by using this
design. By so doing, the best compromise between the greatest possible downforce and the lowest
possible air resistance can be accomplished.
The endplate of front wing is designed purposefully to split the air flows to other sides so that it does
not hit on the front wheels. It overcomes the main problem of turbulence around the wheels. The
turbulence generated reduces aerodynamics efficiency and contribute to undesired drag that may down
grade the overall performance of the car.

Nose
The major significant factor in designing the nose of the car is friction drag. This is to allow the flow air
pass through - above and aside the nose without creating turbulence force. The surface of the nose
must be very smooth so that less resistant and drag force will act on it. The nose should be designed in
such a way that it is low to generate more downforce. Generally, the nose itself does not generate much
downforce, but in terms of ergonomics, lower noses will provide clear visibility for the driver when
driving.
The other purpose of the nose is to serve as protection for the driver. It functions as the frontal energy
absorbing structure which will absorb energy in any case of a head-on collision. It is one of the reasons
for choosing carbon fibre reinforced composite material to construct the body shell.

Side pod
The duty of the side pod is to guide the air that passed through the nose to the side of the car. This is
carried out by the splitter located just in front of the side pods. The design of side pod can smoothen out
the air flow that has been disturbed by front wheels. It separates the air flow into two distinct parts; one
is directed into the side pod and other is diverted outside.
The air passes through the smooth surface of side pod with minimum drag force. It works in a way that
the air flow is blocked from hitting the rear wheels. The direct hit of air on the wheels may create
turbulent and this will disturb the whole air flow dynamics on the car. The design allows air to flow in
steadier ways. Apart from that, installing the side pod increases the safety of the car. It will stabilize the
whole body of the car and it protects driver from side collisions.
Its final importance is that air directed into the side pod is used to cool the engine. It acts like a radiator
intake. This design is essential to enhance the general performance of engine and protect it from
overheating.

Top and bottom rear wing

The rear wing is a crucial component for the performance of a race car because it creates the most drag
Most of the total downforce comes from the rear wing. When the wing angle is designed, it is carefully
decided as more wing angle increases the down-force and therefore produces more drag, thus reducing
the top speed of the buggy.
In this design, two rear wings are assembled on the car as rear wings are used to create downforce and
stabilize the car. In usual condition, the front wing is producing much more downforce than the rear
wing. It makes the front tyres of the street racer much heavier at high speed and when this kind of
situation happens, it is very hard for the driver to control the movement of the car. Therefore, two real
wings are installed in the design to make it safer to be controlled and increase its stability in high speed.
Besides creating downforce, the bottom rear wing can as well work as a diffuser. This approach was
initially ignored by race car designers and the inverted wing-shaped side pods were the first effort to
generate downforce with the vehicles body. Only after banning the sliding seals was this basic idea
reintroduced. In this way, it is used to guide and control airflow underneath the car and to increase the
speed underneath the car. The air flow moves at a very high speed below the car and it lowers the
pressure on it. Higher pressure above the car therefore pulls the car down to the track.

Final Design Detail

From the outcomes at the end of this design and production of the non structural body shell (chassis) of
a street racer, it is believed that this report can lead to a high performance product in a few different
perspectives and this is supported by the figures and conceptual analyses included in the design and
production process.
This design gives the car better aerodynamic properties and stability. Besides, the use of high strength
fibre reinforced composite material improves the race car safety factor. This is a plus point as safety is
an important factor in motor racing. Also, substantial weight reduction is achieved when the car body is
fabricated using composite material as this material is low in density.
Material is a very important aspect for a car body design. It is best to have a high strength and low
weight material as this can enhance the safety of the driver and at the same time fulfil the requirements
in competitions. Also while racing, a nicely designed RC car can give the driver additional confidence.
Besides the performance, aesthetic of the designed car also has to be considered. According to Ornstein
(2011), the good appearance of a car determines a lot of other factors especially when the final product
is put up for sale.

Marketing a Street Racer

When an automobile is designed solely for speed races on circuits or closed courses, the performance of
the car is highly dependent on aerodynamics, electronics, suspension, tyres and the skills of the driver.
Its economic effect is very large as millions of people watching races worldwide. The market is huge due
to its attractive racing event. Its high popularity attracts investment from big companies by the mean of
technology advancement to improve the performance of the race car in all aspect (Lowden, 2012).
The first Unique Selling Proposition (USP) of this particular Street Racer is the body, which is a carbon
fiber design featuring front and rear wings, a diffuser, and side-pods which were all properly analyzed.
The front and rear wings were also scaled down and tested in a wind tunnel to find the optimal angle of
attack for the average vehicle speed seen during racing competitions.
Another special feature of the Street Racer is its high speed and low weight. This feature makes it
suitable for street racers who race for fun and participate in competitions. Since there are a lot of race
teams in the world that feature in the International Federation of Model Car Racing (IFMAR) World
Championships, these teams are the target market.

REFERENCES
Lowden J. H. (2012). A Beginner's Guide to Buying and Racing Radio Control (RC) Cars, www.the-wow-
collection.com/software/rccars.pdf

Lowden J. H. (2012). A Beginner's Guide to Buying and Racing Radio Control (RC) Cars, www.the-wow-
collection.com/software/rccars.pdf

Ornstein M. (2011). Race Car Body Design, http://mikeornstein.com/wp-

content/uploads/2014/07/Race-Car-Body-Design-Semester-1.pdf

Pugh S. (1991). Total Design, Addison Wesley Ltd., Wokingham, UK.

S. M. Sapuan, K. W. Ham, K. M. Ng, C. K. Woo, M. K. A. Ariffin, B. T. H. T. Baharudin, A. A. Faieza, E. E.

Supeni and N. A. A. Jalil, 2009. Design of composite racing car body for student based competition. Sci.
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